Irvings American Progeny
Washington Irving had the unique opportunity of helping a new nation forge its own identity. America, fresh out of the revolution, looked for an author to take charge and create something that seemed to be missing from the newly born nation. He took this responsibility seriously and made a mythology that founded an American literary tradition. He took bits and pieces from the Old World and incorporated them into the New in such a manner that what he wrote appeared original, and yet tied into a tradition that was centuries old. He did this in a manner that astonished many Europeans who believed an American could never produce literature with such a strong English foundation. Although Irving relied heavily on European influence, he drew distinct lines between the American and the European and his plot lines illustrate the struggle between the United States and England.
This amazing period in the nation’s history provided an excellent backdrop for Irving’s work. “‘The Legend of Sleepy Hollow’ (is)…a celebration of the bounty of the United States,” (Bowden, 72). This bounty fueled the fire of social change that was burning in the U.S. at the time. “If we ever had a period during which social progress was not retarded then it was exactly the period Rip slept through. In that generation we were transformed from a group of loosely bound and often provincial colonies into a cocky and independent republic with a new kind of government and—as the story itself makes clear enough—a whole new and new-fashioned spirit,” (Young, 466). Irving took full advantage of the new scene around him, and immortalized himself by demonstrating the importance of what he saw. “‘When I first wrote the Legend of Rip Van Winkle,”...
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...59): 137-149. Rpt. in A Century of Commentary on the works on Washington Irving. Ed. Andrew B. Myers. Tarrytown: Sleepy Hollow Restorations, 1976. 330-342.
Roth, Martin, Comedy and America. Port Washington: Kennidat, 1976.
Snell, George, “Washington Irving: A Revelation.” The Shapers of American Fiction: 1798-1947, (1947). 105-16. Rpt. in Nineteenth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Dennis Poupard. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 1982. 382-383.
Springer, Haskell. “Introduction to Rip Van Winkle & The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” (1974). Rpt. in A Century of Commentary on the works on Washington Irving. Ed. Andrew B. Myers. Tarrytown: Sleepy Hollow Restorations, 1976. 480-486.
Wagenknecht, Edward, Washington Irving: Moderation Displayed. New York: Oxford UP, 1962.
Young, Philip, Fallen From Time: Rip Van Winkle. Kenyon Review, Vol. XXII (1960): 547-73. 457-479.
Romanticism is an essential part of the early forms of American literature. Romantic’s, who value feelings and intuition as opposed to reason, seek to reveal higher truths through their writings. One way to reveal these truths is by the use imagination, as Washington Irving and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow do. Through the utilization of imagination, Washington Irving and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow reveal distinct truths about life.
Throughout Irving’s story, he used characterization, irony, the dreams, and other literacy devices to bring The Legend of Sleepy Hollow to life for Irving’s audience.
In Washington Irving’s work “Rip Van Winkle,” Irving demonstrates all characteristics of an American Mythology rather humorously. These characteristics affect the story attracting the attention of readers and impacting the reader’s experience of the story by relishing America’s unique attributes and values. In “Rip Van Winkle,” Irving incorporates attributes of American Mythology by setting the story in exciting pastimes, filling the story with strange and exaggerated characters, and featuring magical mysterious events.
Washington Irving: Moderation Displayed". Oxford UP. 1962. 233. in Discovering Authors.
The original story by Washington Irving starts out in a small town of Sleepy Hollow. Irving paints an image of bountiful crops, beautiful scenery, and prosperous landowners. Ichabod Crane was a local pedagogue, who taught at the local schoolhouse. He was known for his strict ways and yet he was very popular amongst the families of his students- especially the ones who had ?pretty sisters.? Ichabod enjoyed spending fall evenings with the old widows as they sat by a fire and told stories of ghosts and demons and other supernatural beings. One story that was always told was one of the legendary Headless Horsemen. The tale tells of a soldier who had his head shot off with a cannon ball. His ghost now roamed Sleepy Hollow on his horse, looking for his lost head. In place of his head, sits a jack-o-lantern, which had a fiery glow.
Despite the evidence that Washington Irving uses to show his love for America in his stories, he portrays some characters in the Devil and Tom Walker and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow as greedy. Irving shows concern for America by placing stories in uniquely American moments. In this essay I will prove through passages and quotes from Irving's stories that he shows his love for America in his stories and portrays some characters as greedy in the two stories.
...n American Literature. By Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 387-452. Print.
Irving Washington. "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Nina Baym. 5th ed. Vol. 1. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1998. 948-69.
Have you ever imagined being asleep in the forest for twenty years, coming back home and not knowing what has gone on all those years of your absence? Rip Van Winkle went through that, and had to come back home and face some real changes. The author Washington Irving has some interesting characters whom he puts in his short stories. Irving puts some characters in his short stories to reflect on some of his life. For example, Irving has similarities between Rip Van Winkle being asleep in the forest 20 years and Irving was in Europe for seventeen writing short stories and being the governor’s aid and military secretary. These two situations are similar, because they both didn’t know what they were going to come back too and were gone for such a long period of time. Irving does put some of his own life into his short stories and with a reason for his self-reflective works.
Washington Irving’s short story, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” was adapted into a movie titled “Sleepy Hollow” directed by Tim Burton nearly two centuries after the original publication. When the story was adapted as a film, several extensive changes were made. A short story easily read in one sitting was turned into a nearly two-hour thriller, mystery, and horror movie by incorporating new details and modifying the original version of the story. The short story relates the failed courtship of Katrina Van Tassel by Ichabod Crane. His courtship is cut short by the classic romance antagonist-the bigger, stronger, and better looking Broom Bones. Ichabod wishes to marry Katrina because of her beauty but also because of the wealthy inheritance she will receive when her father, Baltus Van Tassel and stepmother, Lady Van Tassel die. However, the film tells the story of Ichabod Crane as an investigator who is sent to Sleepy Hollow to investigate the recent decapitations that are occurring. These modifications alter the original story entirely, thus failing to capture the Irving’s true interpretation of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” The film and the original story have similarities and differences in the plot, characters, and setting.
Scudder, Horace E. "Recent American Fiction." Critical Essays On William Dean Howells, 1866-1920. Ed. Edwin H. Cady and Norma W. Cady. Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1983. 37-57
I think that by Washington Irving using a narrator for the story, the reliability of this story is generally up in the air. And the reader has to figure that Rip Van Winkle was truly asleep for twenty years and didn’t just lie to escape his wife. Or that there was even a man who was carrying a keg of liquor up the mountains. By trusting the narrator, it adds a complexity to the story because the reader has to believe everything that they were told.
Irving uses many other images and scenes within this story that could be delved into further. However, I believe these three main points, along with the knowledge of the political climate of the times, shows Irving’s genius in representing both sides of the political gamut. Irving was able to cater to both the British and the Colonist without offending either side. Irving’s genius was that even though this was an allegory of its time, its elements could represent either or both sides of the conflict during the Revolution. This dual representation in an allegorical story ensured his success, in both countries as a writer. It allowed Irving to make a political statement without taking sides.
In Rip Van Winkle, Irving shows his doubts in the American Identity and the American dream. After the Revolutionary war, America was trying to develop its own course. They were free to govern their own course of development; however, some of them had an air of uncertainties on their own identity in this new country. Irving was born among this generation in the newly created United States of America, and also felt uncertainty about the American identity. Irving might be the writer that is the least positive about being an American. The main reason for this uncertainty is the new born American has no history and tradition while the Europe has a great one accumulated for thousands of years. Therefore, in order to solve this problem, Irving borrows an old European tale to make it take place in America. This tale related to the Dutch colonists haunts the kaatskill mountains. In order to highlight the American identity, Irving praises the “majestic” mountains which Europe lacks. He describes the mountains that “their summits…will glow and light up like a crown of glory” Nevertheless, the use of these ancient explorers into Rip Van Winkle only to show that although American has formed its own identity, no one can cut its connection with Europe. No wonder when America was still under tyranny of the British rule, some people still cannot cut the blood relationship with Europe. Therefore, the American identity is blurred by their relationship with Europe since then.
Irving, Washington. "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Ed. Illustrated Arthur Rackham. United States: David McKay, 1928.